


νοσταλγία Ivar's PoV

by Luce_cm



Series: νοσταλγία [2]
Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Inspired by Hades and Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Mythology References, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:08:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28352937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luce_cm/pseuds/Luce_cm
Summary: This goes a little bit into Ivar’s perspective on νοσταλγία, and the chapters are probably gonna be chronological but not consecutive. I don’t really know how to summarize this, help pls
Relationships: Hvitserk & Ivar (Vikings), Ivar & Ubbe (Vikings), Ivar (Vikings)/Reader, Ivar (Vikings)/You
Series: νοσταλγία [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2076336
Comments: 8
Kudos: 34





	1. þrá

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> þrá (thra): a throe, pang, longing (Old Norse)
> 
> This chapter is parallel to the Prologue of the main story

He curses his weakness. He curses every day that he was never able to kill the mewling and pathetic boy he once was. The needy boy that could do nothing but watch, watch and wish, watch and think about what life could have been for him if he had been _normal._ The same boy he still is, much to his chagrin.

Because when night falls, when there’s no more blood to shed, no more battles to fight on, no more voices around him…Ivar feels stupidly, childishly, shamefully _alone_.

He hasn’t been alone in his whole life. His mother’s sometimes-overbearing presence, Floki’s teachings, Ubbe’s quiet support; people were always there, making sure he wasn’t alone, making sure he didn’t stop and think about what he was missing, about how while others found wives and had children, he tried and failed at fucking a slave that could look at him only in disgust and fear, about how all he could -can- do when it comes to the things normal men do is watch.

But he remembers his father’s words, he remembers his lesson. Ivar is not a normal man, he doesn’t think like other men, he doesn’t fight like other men, he doesn’t lead like other men. But he still does. Fight, lead, conquest, triumph. He still does, and he may not be a normal man, but he still became King, he still gave the Gods and his parent’s memories something to be proud of.

He knows that should be enough.

And yet when they return from a raid, satisfied and battle-worn, he sees every time the absence in the docks, an absence of something that was never there in the first place.

Most of his men run to their wives, their sons and daughters, their families. And he watches them, he always has, all he could do once was watch. And he still does. He watches them embrace their laughing children and ruffle their hair, kiss their loving wives and enjoy their soft touches.

He sees in their eyes as they approach the docks that they are satisfied with the raid and can’t wait to return to their homes; and Ivar…Ivar wants to turn the ships around, go back and raid some more, fight some more, kill some more.

He wants to go back and he doesn’t want to return from there, he wants to stay in the battlefields, stay amongst the dead and the dying, if only so that he can forget he has nothing to return to.

But he grits his teeth and focuses on the bloodshed ahead, the battles promised, the wars to be started. If in the dead of night Freyja hears him ask to know why he was fated to never know what love is, only the Gods know of his weakness, and it shall stay that way.

Fenrir will break free before anyone knows he craves softness, love; so much so he is willing to lick it off a blade’s edge.

There’s not much time to think about it, though, when Dublin itself is threatened by a Saxon army that bears…unique characteristics. Dark-skinned, oddly-clothed warriors of broad swords and strange formations fight alongside them, and in an even bigger number, his brother’s scouts say, a group of foreign settlers and warriors seem to accompany the Christians, with strange customs to follow, strange tongues to speak in, and oddly enough, strange Gods to worship.

He goes to his brother’s aid, and Ivar will admit he is surprised the Saxons and those foreigners stand their ground and fight.

Ivar leads the chariot to Ubbe and Hvitserk’s side, eyeing the Saxon and the foreign leader as they approach, their army at their backs. Soon enough, they sound the horns and the battle starts.

He hears his men call their wives’ names, their daughters’ names, their sons’ names; like they can ward off death by having something to love, something to call their own.

Stupid. Pathetic.

He doesn’t need any names; he doesn’t need any love.

Don’t they know who he is? He is Ivar the Boneless, they can’t kill him.

The Gods willed it so that he lives, they did it long ago and they still do so. He wonders why, has asked why, demanded to know why, many times before.

But it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t need no names.

So, in the name of death, he leads the charge.

____

He catches sight, distracted, as the man in the foreign armor stumbles his way through the battlefield, towards the woods.

Ivar wouldn’t have taken him for a coward, and it seems he isn’t fleeing, but rather calling for someone. The man calls what to Ivar sounds like a name, even if their language and accent sounds odd in his ears, and the Viking stops to watch.

He always has, all he could do once was watch. And when it comes to the emotion that echoes in the man’s yells as he stumbles and falls, Ivar deems all he will ever be able to do is watch.

A woman cradles the fallen warrior in her arms, her dress flowing like a mirage of red in all the mist and cold. Ivar watches her murmur words, caress the man’s face with care and grief.

He haters her in that moment. He hates her grace, her weakness, her beauty, her kindness. He hates all of it, because he knows that softness will get her killed.

He watches raptly as one of Ubbe’s men charges towards her while some other of those foreign warriors that are aiding the Saxons take her soldier from her embrace. For a moment Ivar feels a pang of…something, a loss that isn’t quite his to have, because what will he lose when she’s killed by that Viking? Nothing he has ever needed.

But then the woman turns around, a metal shield in her hand and stops the man from attacking her. There’s a ferocity to her, a wildness, as she attacks the fallen Viking that Ivar cannot even be bothered to remind himself she is an enemy.

Her teeth close around weak flesh and soon blood fills her mouth, but it is Ivar the one licking his lips, chasing a taste that is not there. The air us pushed out of his lungs as he watches her lift her arm over her head and strike the Viking with one last arrow.

He watches her kill, a mirage of the red of the blood and her dress, and he has never wanted anything as much as he wants to see those eyes meeting his. He wants to witness the fire behind her eyes, he wants to hear the fury in her voice, he wants to taste the blood on her lips.

And it is as if the Gods have heard him, as if Freyja finally answered, for the woman turns around and meets his eyes across the field. A current goes down Ivar’s body at the feel of her focus being on him, and while a part of him wants her to attack him, wants her to fight him and make him bleed; he only raises his axe towards her, and with a nod, acknowledges her kill.

She is startled, stumbles back, but it seems she is reluctant to take her eyes off his too. Still, before long she turns her back and darts into the woods, and Ivar is left with a hunger like never before.

____

He retires early to his tent, hearing faintly of his brother boasting about how they will crush the Saxons come morning.

He should be there, rejoicing with them in the battle won and those to come, he should be drinking and enjoying the night. But he can’t get that…that woman out of his mind. She was dressed like a noblewoman, like a dream, and yet she was there, in the midst of battle like a chimera adorned with the red of the dress and the blood.

And Ivar keeps replaying in his mind the moments he saw her. When she wept over the fallen warrior, her hands softly tracing over the man’s features. Her fingers pressed to the dying man’s lips, her eyes on his with emotions Ivar would never be at the other end of.

Swirling the horn cup in his hand, he feels his face twitch in anger as he recalls her. He hates her, her pathetic softness that should have had her killed by now, her words that he read on her lips, foreign in more ways than one to him.

And then she shed her softness like a snake its skin, and Ivar can remember with a pit of tension in his chest when he saw her kill. When her small body cowered under that shield, and the slight hesitation before she took an arrow in her hand and drove it through the man’s knee.

He can almost see her again, like an avenging Valkyrie in that red dress, holding herself above that Viking and breaking the bones of his face, hit by hit.

Her lips parting in a furious scream before she got her teeth on the man’s arm. The blood staining her teeth, her lips, dripping down her chin. Her eyes when she lifted her gaze to find his and…

Ivar throws the cup around the room with a growl before he can let his mind slip further.

She…she has done something to him. This isn’t his fault, that damn woman has done something to him.

Ivar has prided himself all his life in not falling for stupid things like lust as Hvitserk does, in stomping on softness instead of craving it like Ubbe. This woman, she…surely is a witch, a…a lie. She has done something to his mind, he is certain.

He has thought about her skin, her hands, her hair, her body; ever since she darted back to the comfort of the woods. And even now, if he closes his eyes, he can still recall the fire in her gaze when she met his own across the battlefield.

He hates her. For her softness. For her fire. For the way she has somehow burrowed herself a place in his mind.

His hand blindly reaches for his crutch, and he is standing up before he can stop and think about this. Curse her and what she is doing to his mind.

“Hvitserk, brother, come here!” He calls out as he leaves the tent behind, stopping his stride so he can let go of his right leg and motion for his brother to get closer. When he does, Ivar allows himself a smile, grasping comfortably at his brother’s shoulder. He will drive her out of his mind, he will prove himself she was either a mirage or a lie. “Send a messenger and tell the Saxon I changed my mind. I agree to the talks.”

“What?”

“Let’s…negotiate,” He states, even if the word feels like defeat, the stupidity of attempts at peace bitter in his tongue. At his brother’s questioning glare, he shrugs one shoulder, “I have someone I want to talk to.”


	2. Vænn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vænn: beautiful, hopeful, promising (Old Norse)
> 
> This chapter is parallel to Chapters 11-12 of the main story (would be 12-13 on the AO3 system)

You smile more freely now, he notices. Like you don’t resent the smiles that curve your lips, like you’ve started to realize he isn’t chaining you.

He watches you study a plum you’ve only taken one small and delicate bite off of, as you muse to yourself and, apparently, to him,

“Back home they made wines with these. With many things, actually. Dandelions, cherries,” Your words die with a small chuckle that shakes your shoulders, and you pause to take another small bite of the fruit. “My favorite is roses.”

Ivar only hums a response, because he doesn’t exactly know what to say to that. He was never the best at…talking, at this apparently easy familiarity; and while lately you do seem to be willing and able to strike a conversation about anything and nothing, Ivar will admit he doesn’t know how to deal with that, so he mostly chooses to stay silent and listen to you talk.

Which you do. A lot. He has a feeling you think you talk and share a lot less than you actually do.

But you give a lot away. He may not be good at talking and charming like Hvitserk or Sigurd, or approachable and easy to confide in like Ubbe; but he is good at watching people.

He watches you, and notices you flinch when a fire is breathed too much life, takes note of the way your eyes soften when he says your name, and is delighted to see your smile is colder when it is directed at someone that isn’t him.

And you also talk a lot. Which he doesn’t mind, the Gods know he doesn’t mind. The sound of your voice seems to be perpetually stuck in his head, and although the arrogant and insufferable little tone you get when you think you are right is infuriating, it is much preferable to when he didn’t know the sound of your voice at all, or the little drag of your accent when you speak his language, or the fluidity of when you speak in yours.

“Oh, and pomegranate wine!” You continue, licking a drop of juice from the side of your wrist up, and his eyes follow the movement. You lift big eyes to him as if you don’t realize how much he wants to trap that small wrist in his own hand and lick any offending drops himself. “You don’t have pomegranates here, do you?”

“Would you want some?”

But you shake your head almost immediately, “No, no, I can’t eat them. It’s…the fruit of the temptation, Hiereiai cannot eat the seeds of it.”

He remembers almost all your tales of the Gods you worship, and the six pomegranate seeds that made a Goddess remain in another realm for half eternity has always stayed with him. Maybe because of how it is one of the tales you don’t think much about before speaking of it, you don’t pick and choose at what to say when you speak of her.

And Ivar wonders to himself, if six seeds of this fruit could make a Goddess be bound to that Underworld; what they could do to a mortal woman, a woman that, like the Goddess you speak of, isn’t allowed to eat them.

The errant thought of telling his brother to arrange for some merchant to find him pomegranates stays for a few moments too long on his head.

Because he wasn’t lying, before, when he told you that he could give you anything you wanted. He would, even if admitting it is giving away control, and even worse, giving it to you, power for you to hold over him; he would.

It doesn’t matter, he supposes. You’ll be his wife soon, he’ll have as much power over you as you have over him.

It will be even, then. You will be equals. That has to be what you wanted, even if you still refuse to accept the idea of marrying him.

You didn’t leave him any choice, after all. If he was the one with power, you’d be cold and look at him with hate in your eyes; but Ivar knows if he let you have power without keeping some for himself, you’d run back to your burnt city, you’d leave him.

Ivar knows sooner or later you’ll come to accept it. He knows it, and he knows you should want at least the title of queen if not that of wife. Because even if he didn’t know who you were, if he chose to ignore it like he did in those first days in the run-down village near Dublin, he would know you were made to rule, to command. It’s written in the way you walk, in the way you talk and hold your head high, in that insufferable arrogance, in that stubbornness.

____

There’s something strange about you when you say your goodnight after the announcement of your marriage is brought up before his brothers, but Ivar decides not to dwell on it. And, as he leaves the dim room where he introduced you to his older brother and announced you are to be his wife, he sees Ubbe waiting by a wall, arms crossed over his chest as he stares Ivar down.

“She’s beautiful,” Ubbe comments as he steps away from the wall, “Doesn’t mean she will make a good wife.”

“I’m not marrying her because of beauty, brother.”

He’s marrying you because he has to keep you with him, because he knows now just as he knew when he first saw you in that field, that you were sent by the Gods, by Freyja, to be at his side. The Gods called you to cross many seas, to travel across half a world, and he knows it was because you and him are Fated to meet, to know each other.

And he knows that slave was right, when she spoke of how it all leads to pain and suffering and so it is a proof of the Gods’ favor when people are chosen to suffer. She said those who endure are rewarded, he still remembers her quiet voice uttering the words, but he hadn’t believed her, not at first.

But now, and ever since he first saw that mirage in the red dress with gentle caresses and loving words turn around with a war cry and the fierceness of a Valkyrie, he knows that slave was right, and the Gods do reward those who endure. And one way or another, for a purpose he wishes he knew but doesn’t yet, you were sent to him as the Gods’ gift for enduring a life of pain and suffering; he knows this.

“What are you marrying her for then, Ivar?”

“Why do you care?”

“Because-…brother, you could do this the…the normal way. Find a woman you care for, a woman that wants to be your wife, not some captured witch that fears you.”

He wanted to interrupt him, tell him he has never had a chance to do things _the normal way_ , because while Ubbe may try to tell him he is just like his brothers, he isn’t. And Ragnar was right, he had to accept that he isn’t a normal man, and that means he can’t do things the normal way, like normal men do.

Instead of bringing up a conversation that will make his brother look at him with that pathetic compassion, that brotherly pity, in his eyes; he clarifies,

“She doesn’t fear me. She fears _you_.”

The other man doesn’t relent, and when Ubbe steps forward, trying to make him understand, “And why do you think that is? I see what she’s trying to do, I see clearly. She’s bewitched you!”

He rolls his eyes with an exaggerated movement of his head, and meets the eyes of his older brother with what is sure to be the deadpan tiredness of hearing so many times about women being able to bewitch the men in his family.

The only woman he has seen use her cunt or her lips to actually gain power is Margrethe, but no, no one thinks she might have bewitched any of his useless brothers. Or cursed him, Ivar has toyed with that idea many times since that damn night when he tried fucking her.

But it is stupid to think a woman would bewitch his father, or him. He may be a cripple, but he’s not an idiot; he would know if you were trying to fool him, if you were trying to play with his head. He thought you were, at first, before he knew you and your mouth that betrays your truths before you can stop it, and your eyes that give away every softness and every fury.

He knows he would have been able to tell if you tried tricking him.

Mainly because you wouldn’t be this infuriating brat if you actually tried getting something you wanted from him, he gathers.

Ubbe just looks at him with the pressed lips and disappointed eyes of a brother that tries acting like a father, before turning his back and walking away.

____

Your surprise him by appearing in his rooms, but before he can fully form a question as to why you are here, you reach up with shaking hands to your shoulders

Your dress drops to the floor and you stand before him, bare and beautiful and _his_ , his to admire, to touch, to…

But you talk, because you talk a lot, you talk a lot more than you realize. And you speak of how you’re willing to offer your body to him if only to avoid becoming his wife, of how _he doesn’t have to do this_.

And it is once again like sitting in front of a slave that trembles before him, that kisses him at his brother’s request, that barely masks her disgust when she is forced to touch him.

“Get dressed.”

You cover yourself, and soften your voice but not the way he wants you to. Because now you sound scared, helpless, desperate. And you plead for a way to avoid becoming his wife, for an easy path to escape him.

And he wants to punish you, he wants to make you regret ever thinking you can toy with him, he wants…he wants to make you admit it. He wants to make you shed that…that softness of yours, he wants to…

He doesn’t know what he wants.

He thinks a part of him actually wants you to hurt him, to be cruel. To just…prove him right, prove to him that he can’t have that warm familiarity of having you share your day with him, that fascinating enjoyment of being taught your tongue, those smiles that he earns more and more easily as time goes by.

A part of him wants you to prove him right, and to be cruel and a lie. A chimera, a vision, like he thought you were when he first saw you on that battlefield.

It would certainly make things easier, if he could let go of the childish and pathetic hope of having something _normal_ , like a wife that does not despise him, a woman that actually wants him.

But things aren’t easy, so he just spews venom and barely-hidden insecurities in the form of accusations, and prays your own arrogance and your own temper keeps you from seeing how with nothing but _you_ , you can have him at your mercy.


	3. Unna

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Unna: to grant, bestow; to love (Old Norse)
> 
> This one is parallel to chapter 21 of the main story (22 on AO3 system cause it counts the prologue)

Your eyes shine with what looks like tears as you trace delicate fingers over the gold flowers.

“It’s beautiful,” You whisper, but he thinks he isn’t meant to hear it. You lift big eyes to him, with that way of yours of making his heart hurt when you smile, “Why flowers?”

_“Why do you insist on-…” Ivar almost knocks down another small little planter with a batch of wildflowers, and he grunts out a curse as he catches it, settling back into place. “Why so many fucking plants, woman?”_

_You smile from your place sitting cross-legged on the floor, but don’t lift your gaze, or deviate your attention, from your careful planting of some seeds he sure doesn’t recognize, but gathers you do._

_You answer is simple, natural._

_“I like flowers.”_

_Even where you sit, surrounded by dark wood and in a land of cold and death, you still hold so much warmth and light; that Ivar can picture you with the sun’s light on your smiling face, sitting amongst a field of wildflowers, can see it in his mind with so much clarity._

_He wonders, not for the first time, what a place like this, a man like him, can do to a woman like you, to your softness and your warmth and your light._

_It tastes like regret, like grief, taking you away from those fields of flowers._

“You like flowers.” He supplies simply.

You accept his words, and circle the crown in your hands, eyeing it with admiration. He made sure the artisan that made it was the best available, and the old man didn’t disappoint. He can even pinpoint the runes etched into the creases of the leaves.

Ivar notices your hesitation at putting it on, but you still stand from your place on the bed and walk to a nearby mirror. Fitting enough, he thinks, that you put the crown on your head yourself.

You keep insisting on how he needs to let you be able to make your choices if he wants to have you at all, and he didn’t choose this for you. Power, that is. You were born to hold power, he knows this, for it it’s written in the way you walk, the way you talk; and you were fated to rule alongside him, he knows this too, for it is etched in the way he feels when he has you at his side, the way you raise your chin and straighten your back before the people of Kattegat.

Ivar watches you smile at your own reflection, your hair loose and wild yet still helping the golden circlet stand out. It makes him think of the crown of flowers you wore the day you married; it makes him think of who you were before the Greeks made you their Anassa.

And he thinks of what could have been, he cannot help it. If you had followed your mother all the way to Scandinavia before you found yourself in Greece, if you had come to Kattegat before he was King, before you were their Priestess.

He wonders if he could have had you, when the only crown he could offer you was the one made of flowers.

He stops himself before he can let his thoughts spiral down that particular path, because he has before, reminding himself that for a woman that exchanged her hand for an army -for a Kingdom- once before, Ivar, the poor cripple that couldn’t even fight like his brothers, that couldn’t lead like does now, that couldn’t walk like he does now, that had nothing to offer other than mocking whispers and side glances to follow you around; Ivar was not someone that woman -you- would dare spare a second thought towards.

Fate deemed it so that you were brought to his side here and now, not before, and the Gods have a reason for it. They have to. There has to be a reason for something, at least.

If not for why he was born the way he was, if not for why Ragnar had to be the way he was, if not for why he had to endure the pain he did -and still does-, if not for why his mother had to be taken from him, if not for any of it, for _this_.

For why you’re here with him now, and not before.

For why he watches you make a face at your own reflection in the mirror, and dainty fingers straighten wild hair, and finds the closest thing he’s ever felt to peace, fragile and terrifying as it is.

He once was certain, and now still dares hope, the reason is that you are the Gods’ answer to all that has happened. That the slave was right, and he was to endure the pain, the humiliation, the grief, to earn you.

You are still struggling with your hair, and it draws a chuckle out of him, “The thralls will braid your hair later, and you’ll b-…”

“I don’t want braids.”

He frowns, “Why not?”

“They-…growing up, it was the one thing that made me different from Sieghild.”

He remembers the imposing woman that calls you her daughter. Broad, muscular, and rough. Yggdrasil tattooed on her face deepening the gravity in her expression, the wise but defiant quirk of her mouth. As tall as Ubbe, and with fiery hair and determined green eyes.

“I’m sure it wasn’t the only thing.” Ivar quips with a smile, a smile that falters when he realizes how he had to stop himself from adding an endearment at the end of his sentence.

A voice in his head reminds him of how pathetic, how weak, it is, that with only a smile and the softness in your gaze you can twist him into knots, can make him forget you are not his wife by choice, can put words like ‘my love’, ‘my sweetheart’ and so many more at the tip of his tongue.

You laugh as you walk back to the bed with him, conceding, “It was the one thing that let them know I wasn’t a Varangian.”

“Everyone here knows you aren’t Viking.”

“Why do you want to see me in braids?”

Ivar breathes in through his nose, considering whether or not to tell you of how he wants to see you with intricate and delicate braids sitting next to him on your own throne, reminding everyone that looks at you of your status, of your might and your strength. And that the woman they see, in all her beauty and her power, is _his_.

Instead, he shrugs, “If you won’t wear them, I see no reason to tell you.”

It is still remarkably easy to taunt you, to earn that stubborn shine in your eyes, that quirk of your mouth that says you enjoy this as much as he does.

“One braid, for one truth,” You offer finally, head tilted to the side, “Do we have a deal, Viking?”

His eyes narrow, “Why is it since becoming my wife you’ve taken a liking for negotiating?”

“Fighting you has proved pointless.”

“Yet you still do it.”

You bite back a smile, he sees it in the furrow of your lips, in the reluctant shine of your eyes, “Do we have a deal?”

He nods, and explains that braids, especially on brides, are symbols of status, as important as a dress or, signaling with his head to the crown you hold on your hand, jewelry.

Ivar raises a hand between you and lifts one finger, marking he has earned one braid. Your eyes narrow.

“How far are you willing to go?” You ask, and he considers you, imagining you with twin braids at the sides of your head, framing the golden crown you were born to wear, that he was born to give you.

“Four.”

You move so your legs are folded underneath you, and if Ivar were to consider only the glint in your eye, the smile on your lips, the calculating expression; he would believe you are planning a move in war and not a question to ask him.

You ask about Sigurd, surprisingly enough. You ask, more specifically, about Sigurd’s wife, and he has a feeling you know, at least partly, of what that small but furious Saxon Princess told -screamed at- him while Sigurd was recuperating from…Ivar’s mistake.

You ask of whom he talked about when he said he didn’t want to lay with a woman that can’t stand to touch him _again_. Ivar never regrated his words like he does then, but, he figures, there’s no harm in telling you, no harm that telling you that you married a man whose fucking cock doesn’t even work hasn’t already done. If he doesn’t tell you, someone will eventually. He knows of the rumors, and it irks him, leaves him with a restlessness he doesn’t know what to do with, the knowledge that he can’t control what they think, what they say, of him. So he tells you of Margrethe, gritting his teeth at the part of him that whispers you’ll be disgusted, or worse, pity him.

“Maybe y-…” You start, but Ivar interrupts you. He will not hear it, none of it.

Has heard it before, never believed none of those that told him it was an exception to the rule. It’s easy to say normalcy is what one should expect when you are born _normal_.

“Next question.”

“I’m just saying-…”

“Next. Question.”

You ask of his father, of his fame. You ask, and he thinks it is a question you ask yourself too, how one lives with the weight of legacy on one’s shoulders. The answer, for him, is simpler than for you, he thinks. He wishes to surpass his father, to be the most famous Viking that’s ever lived. He thinks you smile with something that looks like pride when he answers that, but doesn’t dwell on it.

You ask what made him spare your life when he first saw you on that field. The answer to that is not as easy as the others, and he holds his tongue, because telling you would mean giving you power over him, giving you an edge over him that he doesn’t have over you. He tells you he was curious, he doesn’t speak of the trembling hand touching the Greek’s cheek and making Ivar feel a cold, an absence, ha hadn’t felt before; he doesn’t speak of the words, still foreign to him in more ways than one, that he tried reading off your lips. He tells you it was a good kill, he doesn’t speak of the bloodied lips that he still can see when he closes his eyes; he doesn’t speak of the fire in your eyes that he stopped a war to be at the other end of again.

____

“My Queen.” Hvitserk mocks a bow as he extends a hand and asks you to dance.

“Gods, don’t call me that.” You laugh, and after throwing a glance Ivar’s way, as to see what his reaction will be to you taking his brother’s hand -he is not yet deluded enough to believe you’d ask for permission-, you step down from the throne and walk towards the dancing people with Hvitserk at your side.

“Is ‘sister’ better?” He hears his brother taunt, and you laugh again.

A part of Ivar feels bitter at the sight of it all. At how easy it is for his brother to make you laugh, to make you light and soft; at how Hvitserk can dance with you and twirl you around, be witness first hand to the way your eyes fall closed and your head falls back as you surrender to the music; at how because of how he was born, and what life made out of him, things cannot be easy for him, not even when it comes to you.

The shieldmaiden, Valdís, comes from behind you and embraces you, dwarfing you in her broad arms, and Ivar watches you laugh as the blonde woman whispers something by your ear.

And your smile seems only to widen as the slave -Freydis, he reminds himself- takes the hand you offer her before accepting your easy embrace.

He has his answers as to why that Greek promised you a kingdom, an army, in exchange for your love, has had those answers for a long time now. But Ivar never understood how the Greeks followed you all the way to Scandinavia, how they saw you lie and kill and die, and never faltered. Seeing how natural it is for you to charm almost an entire kingdom into accepting and maybe even loving the foreign witch they are to call a queen; it gives him the answer.

You return to him soon enough, your breath quick and smile honest.

You sit on the throne at his side, and he can’t help but feel the absence -the rejection- when his hand is left alone, without the touch of yours, on the armrest of his throne.

But, he guesses, it is what he has to get used to. This strange limbo, this woman that no longer insists she is a prisoner but cannot be his wife by choice.

It feels like living on borrowed time, it feels like he’s awaiting execution but doesn’t know where the axe will fall when the time comes.

He tries telling himself he doesn’t know, at least. But he is a cripple, not an idiot. He took you from your people, held you against your will, made you his wife even though you dreaded the title; he knows what your answer will be when the time comes for him to let you make your choice.

But for that to happen Stithulf needs to die, to be dealt with. It may take time, especially if he stalls the more directs attacks towards the Saxon, the way he has been doing for a while now, even before you offered your _arrangement._

And so he continues to live on borrowed time; and he continues to learn more and more things about you; and he continues when it’s the two of you and there’s warmth in your eyes even if there’s an edge in your smile, to sometimes forget the road that took you here.

____

The scouts say Ubbe is due to return from the North of England any day now, and he knows he should be focused on what the plans going forward will be. But there’s something else bothering him.

Ivar is convinced something is going on, but he knows if he tells anyone they will think him crazy. He thinks himself crazy for thinking it, to be honest.

He watches you carefully as you pluck a few lavender flowers from a vase and make a little braid with them, and after days of wondering about this, he cannot stop himself.

“You’ve been bringing plants here.” He states, and you lift big eyes to him.

“I like flowers.” Is all you reply in a mutter, returning your attention to the lavender stems you are braiding together.

“I…” He stops, considering his words, before deciding to throw caution to the wind. “Each time we argue, you bring in a new plant, don’t you?”

He sees the mischievous smile that starts to curve at your lips before you school your features, and he realizes no, he wasn’t crazy.

You lift falsely innocent eyes to him, “Why would I do that?”

“You tell me.”

“I think the burden of ruling is getting to you, husband,” You drawl out, a tease on the curve of your mouth. “Maybe you should stop trying to tell me what to do, that’ll help ease that burden.”

“When have I-…?” He shuts his mouth at the quirk of your eyebrow, because you do have a point there. Ivar amends, “Recently. When have I _recently_ told you what to do?”

You shrug, “You are a smart man, you can figure it out.”


	4. Hjarta

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hjarta: heart (Old Norse)
> 
> This one is parallel to the end of chapter 31, goes up till the beginning of 32 (32 and 33 respectively on AO3 bc it counts the prologue)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a less dominant version of Ivar than what it is usually written, I hope it doesn't dissapoint you, and I'm sorry if it does, but I see him as a sub, and even outside of power dynamics, as a vulnerable character that thrives (and needs) this surrendering of control. Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoy!

You end the kiss with a tenderness that keeps him tethered, dangling at the edge of a cliff and willing to lean forward without a second thought if he could just have you kiss him again.

He curses his weakness. He curses himself for not killing who he once was, desperate for love and softness. He…

His eyes open and meet yours. There’s unfamiliar affection in the way your hand still on his face caresses his skin; there’s familiar madness, familiar fire, in the smile you offer him.

And more than ever it all feels like a mirage.

The mirage of red he saw across a battlefield, words of love for a dead man on her lips before the softness was shed in exchange for the war cry of a Valkyrie.

The mirage of red that stood across from him with a bloodied ring on her finger, smiling at him like the world was just this, kissing him like in another life she’d loved him.

And now once again, the vision draped in red that makes a current go through his body at her touch, that robs him of breath and of thought and of control; stands before him.

And Ivar knows if he moves the illusion will fade, the mirage will vanish before his eyes.

He’s frozen, tethered.

“Kiss me.”

And you do, taking his breath and his heart and his sanity, but giving back so much more.

His hands find purchase wherever they can, however they can to keep you here, keep you with him.

After months -a lifetime- of longing, of madness, of desperation; he kisses you hungrily. Ivar is greedy for every touch of your tongue, for every breath you share, for every sound he can earn for himself.

He knows he should slow down, treasure this, put thoughts back in his head and stave off the bubble of panic inside of him that whispers this is a mirage, this will fade, this is _nothing_. But he can’t, he’s ravished and desperate and right now -a chimera or not- there’s only you and the painful ecstasy of finally having you within reach.

Your voice echoes in his head with a moan of his name, breathy and soft.

His chest _hurts_ , as if his heart, wild and no-longer-his, wants to give in to the lull of your voice.

But your lips are a breath away from his, your weight is soft against his legs but you still hold yourself up, his wife looks at him with what he could fool himself into thinking is love in her eyes but he’s made the promise to let you go.

And he isn’t _enough._ Enough to have you kiss him again, enough to be able to hold your weight against him, enough to make you stay.

Enough to give you what you want from him, enough to _be_ what you want.

And he is suddenly again a weak and pathetic boy trying to will his prick to work before a woman that looks on in disgust, he’s desperate and angry and wants the Gods to answer _why_.

You scramble off of him when he pushes you, and he wishes there weren’t a seat at his back because more than anything he wants to move away, further way from you, from this…this _want_.

He tells you, or tries to. Tries reminding you that the man you married cannot satisfy a woman, that you vowed to be the wife to one cursed by the Gods themselves.

But you don’t listen, of course you don’t. Stubborn, maddening woman.

He can’t look at you when he admits his shame, his failing, but he still feels you step forward again, and you render him helpless with but a touch, forcing his eyes to meet yours, guiding his face up so he can meet your kiss.

Ivar cannot keep himself from sighing against your lips, surrendering to the heady feeling of your mouth softly pressing against his, finding quiet in the moment where your breaths are one, forgetting everything at the soft curve of your smile.

Your eyes meet his, and you quieten his protests, his warnings, his pleas that you let him make sense of the world by accepting this -him- isn’t truly something you can want; with a stubborn shake of your head, as if the answer is simple, as if anything is simple even now that you both stand before something new.

“What I need is you,” You whisper, your hand leaving a burning trail down his chest before your palm presses against his heart. Ivar is certain you can feel it beating wildly under your touch, and his eyes search yours desperately as you press your brow to his. Your voice is low and that familiar blend of soft and fierce when you whisper, “What I want is this.”

____

You’ve moved back from him and settled in bed a few moments ago, but once the daze of being pliant and safe in your embrace vanishes Ivar cannot help but start questioning what just happened, what new enemy his facing, what height the cliff he just jumped off -you pushed him off- of was.

Your words from earlier taunt him, y _our own thoughts are what drives you mad most of the time_ ; and he knows you’re probably -insufferably- right.

Ivar uses his arms to move himself onto the bed, somewhat unmoored by the revelation of being what you want -need- and the hesitation of admitting you are what he wants -needs-; but still finding comfort in the strange familiarity of this routine where both of you live in each other’s space like it is nothing, like you’re bound by the same thread.

From where you are, already settled on your side of the bed, he notices you playing with the golden snake he gifted you a while ago, the bracelet you wear so often he wonders if he should buy you something else.

It is usually not a good thing when you’re quiet. Your voice seems to be perpetually stuck in his head for a while now, and so Ivar cannot help but notice with jarring discomfort each time you’re unusually quiet.

“What are you thinking about?”

You put the bracelet on the small table by your side of the bed, before you turn to him and shrug.

“You.”

You are sitting up on your knees next to him, and the touch of your hand in his is familiar. Ivar dares think it means the same to you as he watches your gaze lower to your joined hands.

When once again lift your face, he notices your attention travel to his lips for a moment, and it fills him with a strange pride, a thrilling warmth, to know you want him.

It is a barely a moment, a blink of his eyes and it is gone, but he sees in your eyes the same darkness he saw when he tasted your blood on his tongue earlier tonight.

“I want you, Ivar,” You say, and with the way the simple words make his chest hurt, his heart falter, all he can offer is a hum. A sound, that sounds distant and muffled as his heart beats madly in his ears. You lean closer, lips a breath’s width from his, “However I can have you.”

Not even the binds that keep Fenrir in place would have kept him from kissing you then.

He is on his back on the bed, just like _then_ , and his hands are trembling, just like _then_. But the press of your body against his is as soothing as it is maddening, and you seal promises that this isn’t a mirage, that this is not yet another failure, against his lips.

For all the months he couldn’t, for all the moments you pulled away, for all the _years_ he’s spent without you, Ivar pulls you to him, claims your mouth and with his hands he draws you closer.

The length of your body is pressed against his, one of your hands tentatively reaching under his shirt and making him wish he had the words to tell you how you don’t have to hesitate, how he wishes you to devour him, to undo him and leave nothing but want in its place, to claim the body that is yours to do as you wish as ruthlessly as you’ve claimed his heart.

Nothing has ever felt like this, this maddening whirlwind of feeling nothing but you and your taste and your smell and the feel of you against him, thinking nothing but how to get you to be closer.

And once again, he knows he should slow down, he knows he should treasure this, but you rob him of every thought, of every breath, of every ounce of control.

And he cannot stop himself, he feels untethered and yet bound, and he kisses and licks and bites and sucks and…Gods, he’s wanted this for so long, wanted _you_ for so long. Ivar moans against your skin, and a satisfied laugh that sounds dark and hoarse leaves your lips, leaving a current to run down his spine.

It is without a warning your hand tightens on his hair, a gasp on your lips that is lost in the moan you draw out of Ivar. You move back, using your grip on his hair to move him back too and look at him, and it takes all of his resolve for Ivar to keep his eyes from fluttering shut.

But, of course, you notice regardless.

“You like it when I pull on your hair, don’t you?” You ask, voice hoarse and yet annoyingly smug when you smile down at him.

“How can you-…” _How can you just_ talk _, even now?_ For a moment Ivar feels the sudden apprehension that this doesn’t mean the same to you, that he doesn’t affect you the way you do him, that you don’t want him like he wants you. But your shoulders rise and fall quickly, and the evidence of him is written in the faint marks on your neck, on your lips that still bear the mark of his kiss. Ivar’s mouth curves as he runs his thumb over your bottom lip. “You never shut up, do you?”

“Not even this could shut me up, you should know better than to expect otherwise.” You mumble in response, before your gaze falls from his and you are seemingly distracted, leaning down and starting a maddening and burning trail of kisses down the column of his throat.

Ivar feels like Gleipnir binds him, makes him give in to your will, and he can’t keep his head from tilting back to give you more access to his skin the same way the wolf cannot break free.

“This,” He repeats, and you only hum in response, not giving anything away. Ivar feels the familiar tinge of anger at being put on the spot, forced to voice his thoughts. But he has to know. “Why now? What changed? I-I don’t understand.”

You stop the maddening trail of your lips on his skin, but you don’t move back just yet, torturing Ivar with the caress of your breaths on the skin your attention made feel hot and flushed.

“Everything changed, or nothing did,” You reply after a few moments, repeating words from before. Leaning back and meeting his eyes, you explain, “I told you once that if you had asked, I would have said yes,” Ivar grits his teeth at the reminder, at the memory of the coldness that took hold of him that night, when you kissed him and with bitter words promised him he could have had everything he’d ever wanted if only he had done things differently. You continue, a slight smile on your lips, “It took me…it took me time, and change, but…I realized I didn’t need you to ask, I didn’t need you to demand. I needed only to make my choice to…”

“Cave?” He supplies with a smile, succeeding in making you roll your eyes.

“I don’t _cave_.” You remind him, but the smile that curves your mouth gives you away, and after a moment you breathe a laugh.

Ivar chuckles quietly at the sight of you, exasperated yet soft as you look at him.

And with that lightness, with that quick beating of the heart that isn’t his anymore, he kisses you again.

____

Ivar loses track of time in the thrill of _this_ , so he wouldn’t be able to say how long it has been, or how far the dawn is. All he knows is that he remains tethered in this dance where you get close enough you burn him from his hollow chest to the tips of his fingers only to then move back and leave him feeling the softness of the dull warmth that soaks into his very bones.

Now he’s enveloped by warmth, your small hand playing with the amulet of Thor that hangs from his neck, your soft breaths and the crackling of the fire the only sound in the room.

His fingers trail up and down the skin of your back, because he can, because he wants to, because…how many times did he wish to be able to do just this?

How many times in all the mornings and nights since you started that little ritual where he helps you with your dress has Ivar imagined what it would be like to give in, to have the steadiness to touch you freely, to be allowed to soak up your warmth and your softness?

You sigh, content, and move closer to him. You’re on your side and so is he, and when you move your legs brush against his, and Ivar cannot help the pang of cold, of old anger, of hesitation and pathetic fear.

But he doesn’t move away, he just continues the soft exploration of his hand on your back, and tries dispelling thoughts that remind him of what he is, of what cannot be, of many things he doesn’t want to think about.

Ivar feels the roughened skin that bears the mark of the fire the Christians lit trying to silence you, and yet against all that the sharp-tongued and arrogant Priestess he brought to Kattegat was, you don’t pull back, you remain content and warm in his embrace.

He remembers now with incredulity and more than a bit of anger at himself how he once thought he’d have _this_ once he brought you to Kattegat with him, even if he kept you at his side in chains.

Now, he knows better. And he may have not seen many things clearly when he first brought you to Kattegat, when he first decided to make you his wife, to keep you at his side; but he does know he was right about one thing: one way or another, the Gods Fated this. One way or another, his heart was yours long before he knew it.


	5. Brim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brim: the surface of the sea, sea, ocean, water (Old Norse)
> 
> Parallel to Chapter 31-ish, but please don't read this before getting to chapter 34 in the main story :)

“Will she kill me?” The Saxon asks, for the first time being the one to start talking first. Ivar doesn’t bother hiding his surprise as he walks to a table, using his arm to lift his right leg onto it, letting him sit.

“Would you want her to?” Ivar asks, mocking. The man looks disgusted, horrified, at him.

“ _You_ would. You…you b-beast, you want to see that witch kill me.” The Bishop grunts, and all Ivar offers as an answer is a laugh. He won’t deny, least of all to a Christian, that there’s something in him that still lingers in the image of you the first time he saw you, when he saw you kill.

“But she won’t.”

“You will.”

“Not yet,” The man’s head drops at Ivar’s words, and it is with a sigh that he stands up, walking to the man. The tease of a blade against his neck is enough to make him look up. “You focus too much on death, for a Christian.”

It is familiar, it is easy enough by now, to put the edge of the knife under the Bishop’s skin and scrape, peeling away flesh and drawing out blood and pain.

“Death surrounds us. Death…death is…”

Ivar stops, waiting to hear whatever it is he has to say. He’s awfully talkative today.

But he doesn’t continue, and so Ivar does. His chest, his arms, his face. For an old man, and a cleric at that, Leofric does withstand an impressive amount of pain.

“Why come to Kattegat?” He insists, the same question that has been repeated, by him and others, for weeks. The Saxon shakes his head. “Why leave Stithulf behind?”

“I am…not needed anymore.”

The vague reply, the stubbornness of keeping secrets from him; it angers him, it makes his blood boil under his skin at the powerlessness, at the uncertainty. The knife goes deeper, and Ivar smiles.

Leofric gags in his own blood, keening in agony, pained sounds leaving bloodied lips.

Still, he mumbles, breaks, prays, “The dead man breathes, and God’s light touches us all. The soulless find a soul in the one true God, and they return.”

The Bishop’s head drops down, and Ivar calls out for whoever is closer to check if he is alive. Whatever the answer is, he will deal with it tomorrow.

When he walks into your bedroom, you’re standing with your back to him tending to some wildflowers you keep by the window.

He knows his arrival doesn’t go unnoticed, but he still lingers by that doorway, letting his eyes roam over the figure of his wife. Dressed as any other woman from here, but just in the way you stand and hold yourself there’s something else, an edge of foreignness that has not changed or dimmed, and that still fascinates him as much as that first day.

Your head turns to the side slightly to signal you know he is here.

“ _Husband_.”

He knows enough of your tongue now to understand what that means, and he knows enough of you and the two of you to return the greeting.

“ _Wife._ ”

When you turn around, your eyes are drawn to his hands, before raking over him searchingly. You frown.

“That blood isn’t yours.”

“Your skill as a healer let you know of that?” He taunts, because honestly he cannot resist the urge to.

Your eyes narrow and your head tilts to the side, and he knows in your head you’re calling him some awful thing in Greek, but it only makes his smile wider.

Instead of offering an answer, you huff and stride away. Ivar chuckles. It is still too easy to get under your skin.

You come back with a bowl of water, and you put it on the table next to where he sits. Ivar is startled when you sit across from him, and grab his hand, choosing to clean the blood off of it yourself.

“This is a lot of blood, Ivar,” You tell him quietly, lifting your gaze to him and offering the faint curve of a smile, as if you don’t realize how you’ve unearthed him, dragged him under a rip current and left him still trying to make out where the surface is with the simple action of tending to him. You ask teasingly, “Should I be worried?”

He scoffs, “No.”

You accept his words with a smile, and return your gaze to your work. It startles Ivar for a moment, the realization that mere months ago this wouldn’t have been your reaction to all this.

You would have demanded he let you know, he would have refused to tell you just because he didn’t want to be told what to do, and you would have grown angry, and then he would have grown even angrier.

But now all you do is accept his words and remain calm and gentle sitting next to him. You’ve let yourself be soft with him, he realizes, a strange surge of pride starting in his chest.

Still, because he can, because he finds himself wanting you to know, he tells you, “It’s Leofric’s.”

“The Bishop?” You frown, “I thought…”

“Soon, most likely.”

You nod your head, accepting his words, but for a few moments too long you seem to linger on it.

“I want to see him.”

“What for?”

“I…” You hesitate, and if he were to guess, the woman that speaks now is the same that, when he first brought you to Kattegat, would always talk about the _should be_ ’s before the truth. “My words are the reason he still lives, he still suffers.”

“Are you going to say you _owe_ that Christian anything?”

“No,” Your response is immediate, and you almost betray a smile, “But-…it is in bad form for a husband to deny his wife’s wishes, you know?”

“Wives normally ask for pretty things, not chained Christians.”

You shrug, lips pulling into a smile that says you know you’ve won. It infuriates him a bit, how easily you turn the tides to your favor.

“You and I don’t do things the normal way, though, do we?”

____

There’s something in the way you walk that Ivar noticed since the very first moment he saw you. Well, maybe not the first, but certainly since that first meeting in Aneridge.

Something about the straight back, the carefully placed hands, the raised chin, the defiant eyes. He knows better than to call it a façade, knows better than to believe the annoying arrogance and the prideful stance are anything other than yours; but it is still a shield you choose to raise, something you consciously do, like when he squares his shoulders and stands taller before his brothers.

And even as you falter at the sight of the bloodied and battered Bishop, you still hold that stance.

You, with your affinity to refer to titles as if they were people apart from those who carry them, would see the Queen of Kattegat, and not…you.

And, Ivar gathers, there isn’t much of _you_ in the way you still stand by his side when your whole body is tight with tension, when you cannot look at the Christian’s face for quite a while.

“Will you…kill me?” The Saxon’s voice is ragged, hoarse, broken; but Ivar’s eyes remain on you.

You look sick, disgusted, but you still lift your chin and shake your head, resolute.

“No. I’m sorry.” Your words are honest, but the Christian only scoffs, blood spitting from his dry lips.

“You aren’t capable of r-remorse,” The Bishop insists, head lolling to the side and ragged breaths coming faster. “You’re just like him. Beasts, monsters, all of you.”

You frown, and your nose furrows, a gesture that remains a tad adorable, a tad soft, even as you are surrounded by blood and death.

Your hand on his arm is gentle but fleeting, a goodbye as you turn your back to the Bishop and walk out of that place.

____

Days later, and he still cannot shake off the uneasy feeling letting you see Leofric’s last moments left him with. And now, his mind also lingers on a world he never knew, that he probably never will; now that you know Laconia, the land your blood rules over, is free from the Christians and their God.

He cannot forget how small and fragile you felt in his arms as you cried and trembled for what you had lost, for what they had won. You cried for the world he took you away from, but maybe…maybe you cried because you were free from it, too.

He wants to believe you will let go of that place now that you know they don’t need you, not like he does. He wants to believe the happiness you feel here -even if you only admit of it when you’re drunk- can measure up to the one you felt in those fields of flowers.

Ivar is distracted from his own thoughts when Freydis walks into the great hall, blue eyes searching for something. Someone, more specifically.

He still remembers her words, and a part of him still clings to them, still wishes for them to be true. In the late nights, where you lay beside him and your voice is hushed and your eyes are soft, where you weave tales of your Gods and your past, where you listen to his own with a strange sort of shine in your gaze; Ivar still believes it to be true, that the Gods reward those that withstand the pain and the suffering. In the rush of pride that Ivar feels when he has you at his side, when you take his outstretched hand and stand beside him before his -your- people, when you sit on the throne at his side like you were born to and smile at him like you two share a secret; Ivar still wonders if it wasn’t a delusion at all, that you were sent to him by Freyja.

She hesitates at the sight of him, and blue eyes look around as she speaks.

“I was looking for-…”

“I know. She isn’t here,” He interrupts, head tilted to the side, “Why were you looking for her?”

A moment of hesitation, before Freydis puts her hands together and places them carefully in front of her. Not so different from how you straighten your back and harden your gaze, but the intent is to give a completely different image than yours, he realizes.

“I worry for her. The Queen told me what the Saxon called you, called _her_ , when she saw him. It hurt her,” The slave mentions quietly, wordlessly obeying his command and walking at his side as Ivar stands up from the throne. After a breath, she continues, “But you do not care to be called a beast, a monster, do you?” She lowers her gaze, “Some of us know better than to expect certain things, I suppose.”

He doesn’t like this. This…strange honesty, this carefully-played part.

“What are you saying?”

“I love her,” She confesses, no hesitation. That wasn’t what he expected, and Ivar stops walking, startled. Freydis shrugs, and offers, “But I know better than to believe a woman like her belongs here.”

“She is here.” Ivar tells her, but he doesn’t know if it is a defiance of her claim or a question.

The slave stays silent for a while, as if considering her words. After a deep breath, she lifts her eyes to him, “Can I speak honestly, and…openly to you?”

There’s a knot of tension and dread settling at his stomach, but Ivar finds himself nodding dazedly, and she smiles slightly.

“The Queen has changed, that is no secret to you I’m sure. Something in her…died, I think,” She takes a deep breath, “A hope, maybe.”

“Hope.” He repeats the word slowly, tasting ash in his tongue.

“I…” She hesitates, lowers her gaze and licks her lips. But when she faces Ivar again, her blue eyes are determined. “I do not say these things with the intent to have any harm befall on her. But I love her, an-…”

“You’ve said that.” He points out curtly. He hates the tight knot of jealousy at the pit of his stomach, at the reminder of how easily you accept Freydis’ love for you.

The prodding and haunting thought of how between the woman you trust and confide in and him, you’d choose _her_ ; doesn’t leave his mind for too long. Perhaps it never left, since he saw her grab your hand and dance with you on the feast after your wedding.

The blonde chuckles, “It is true. And because I love her I…it pains me to see her suffer.”

“She isn’t suffering.”

“She’s a good liar.” She retorts without missing a beat. He leans closer, and in the widening of her blue eyes he knows she realizes she made a mistake.

“Careful,” Ivar warns her, “Insulting my wife isn’t a smart thing to do.”

“It isn’t an insult, she’s…making the best out of the situation she is in,” Freydis’ expression falters, something close to pain, as she continues, “But I have held her as she cried, and I have comforted as she tells me how she doesn’t belong at the side of a monster.”

A familiar feeling, the floor dropping from under him. Like being dragged down to the sea tied to that mast, struggling against the weight of the water that pulled him under, unable to do anything but _drown_. 

He accepts her words with a nod, turning his face away and breathing even if his lungs feel filled with salt water. Ivar blinks and it feels like there’s sand in his eyes; and he frowns but it trembles too.

“But you do not care to be called a beast, a monster, do you?” Freydis presses, an edge of coldness, of cruelty in her dainty voice. “One such as you knows better than to expect love, I suppose.”

____

Your hand is gentle and warm where it rests over his heart, but his chest pulls tight and it feels like it burns; and it feels the same as when you insisted, _so stop that using that word like an insult, because you turned that word into so much more; because_ you _are so much more_.

Your smile is honest and dazed and a little scared, the same as when you leaned up and promised, _I’m happy._

Your eyes are the same blend of softness and steel that put him under your spell so long ago, the same that shone with pain and something else when you told him, _I am myself when I am with you, in a way I never could with any other; never doubt that._

And your voice is quiet, so quiet against the voices of the past, against the beating of his heart in his ears, against the certainties that _happiness is nothing_ ; but he still hears you.

“Everything changed.”

It still hurts, and it hurts to pull away from you and leave you behind. It still hurts because nothing is what it was supposed to, nothing is quite what he wants but he is paralyzed at the possibility of pushing forward and losing ground, nothing makes sense but he dreads going back to when things made sense but he didn’t have _this_.

It is like being pulled from the depths of the sea by his father, the raging water still threatening to pull him under, unable to do anything but take desperate gulps of air and revel in still being able to feel the pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this was okay, I had fun with the ocean thingy but idk if this one was any good. I still hope it was okay tho, hope you liked it!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! Love ya!


	6. Atfǫr

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Atfǫr: method, execution (law), attack (Old Norse)
> 
> Stretches over chapter 34 till 36-ish (chapter 36 picks up a lil bit after the end of this one)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Friendly reminder, so that you’re not caught off guard later, that in this universe Sigurd is alive, living in Bamburgh (Northumbria) married to Blaeja.

Long before Ragnar took him to England and Alfred taught Ivar to play chess, Ivar learned to play hnefa-tafl with Floki.

Ivar remembers, as if it were yesterday that he was spending time with him and not years since Floki had left them; how with the laugh that was uniquely _his_ Floki would taunt him about his wrong moves, and when Ivar would get angry and refuse to play anymore, the boatbuilder would still set the pieces back on the board.

Sometimes it took days, sometimes it took hours, but Ivar always dragged himself back to that chair and called for Floki to join him for another match. Without fail, he was there, sitting across from him with that glint in his eye and taunting him to make his next move.

He remembers those days, and Helga’s quiet laugh as she passed by Floki, her hand over his back and her kohl-lined eyes on the board. And he remembers the first time he won was because of Helga.

It was some years before his father returned, and Ivar remembers the bubbling anger inside him at how Floki had managed to outsmart him for days on end when playing hnefa-tafl. He remembers Helga kneeling next to him so she could be on level with the table, and he remembers her hand over one of the pieces.

“Floki always gives up half of his defenders in the beginning,” She told him, a smile that, like all her smiles were, had a sadness to it. “Even _he_ is predictable, Ivar. Everyone is.”

And she was right. Floki’s moves were predictable in hnefa-tafl, and Alfred’s moves were predictable in chess. And Stithulf’s moves are predictable in war.

And it is easy, at least for him, to see pieces on a board, even now.

It feels strangely reminiscent of the time they faced Aethelwulf, taunting the Saxons with only the presence of the army. It certainly feels the same to Ubbe, it seems, who by the third time they almost taunt Stithulf into attacking grunts a breath and tells him _it is easy to do this all day when you’re sitting on a chariot, brother_.

Still, they make enough time to let the few men they send inside settle and prepare the tunnels to wait for Stithulf, and when tomorrow comes they will make him face them while pretending not to know of the tunnels he will send his best through.

There’s familiarity in the way Ivar and Ubbe lay on the grass near the camp and overlook the city just like they did before York, only this time Hvitserk isn’t with them, only this time so many things have changed that it is almost as if they aren’t the same men.

“Hvitserk did good in finding about those tunnels.” Ubbe comments, and all Ivar offers in response is a grunt.

“They won’t be able to ambush us, but we still need to try to keep the Arabs inside that city,” He tells him, “Fighting them in open fields gives them a victory.”

“That is not something you’d have learned in Dublin.” His brother intones, and Ivar rolls his eyes, turning to lay on his back on the grass.

After a breath, Ubbe does the same, and they lay side by side looking up at the darkening skies.

“Of course I listen to her. Unlike you, I intend to keep my wife with me.”

He ignores the jab at him, only sighs.

After a few breaths of silence, his brother asks, “How is she, by the way? I haven’t seen her in…months?”

“Weeks.”

“Still.”

“She’s…” Ivar shrugs, and at the lack of words offers, “She threatened me to keep me from reaching Valhalla for as long as she has breath if I don’t return.”

Ubbe laughs, but still asks, “Do you think she can do that?”

“I don’t intend to find out.” He sentences, before sitting up and grabbing his bound legs to move them behind him and crawl back to camp.

At his back, Ubbe clears his throat.

“I am happy for you. Proud of you,” His brother tells him. Ivar stays silent, he doesn’t really know what to say to that. Ubbe chuckles, “You…you chose well, Ivar.”

“Better than you, certainly.” He taunts, but his smile is something less cutting than it should be, less mocking than he intended, as he returns to camp.

Late that night, when the few men they sent ahead have already set up within Strepshire, when the tunnels Hvitserk learned about are already theirs and await the Saxons’ ambush through them; Ivar lingers by the map of the city and its surroundings that his brother managed to find before he was to leave Kattegat.

He hears the steps he knows by memory now, and doesn’t turn to acknowledge Ubbe as he walks in. The older man takes a seat nearby, a horn of mead in his hand.

“There’s enough of an opening by now. We can send our men in during the night, wait within the walls.” Ubbe offers, but Ivar doesn’t hesitate to shake his head.

_“You have to be careful, Ivar,” Floki tells him, holding the piece he took like a trophy between them. He narrows his eyes, but the man continues, “The fort will hurt you -and me- once the game starts. You can easily be trapped and cornered inside the walls.”_

“No, we fight on open fields. The Arabs are going to be in those tunnels, we can take care of the Saxons outside the walls.” He orders, and for once Ubbe doesn’t argue.

“If those mercenaries join him outside the walls…”

“We will know. They stick out.” Ivar tells him, the conversation so similar to how they planned to defend Dublin from those foreigners of strange weapons and stranger tactics.

“I will take the flank. They will count on them to unbalance us, right? Well, I have fought them before, I can lead my men against them.”

Ivar doesn’t take his eyes off the map, but he does betray a mocking smile,

“Look at you, brother, taking advice from a Greek witch.”

Ubbe betrays a smile, and a huff of laughter, and it is in that small moment of quiet, in that small and private moment past all the pride and the jealousy, that Ivar admits, only to himself of course, that he has missed his brother, missed what he thought lost when he almost killed Sigurd.

____

Ubbe pushed his men to cover the opening in the city’s walls, keeping the Arab mercenaries trapped inside and at the mercy of the long and thin walls, easily ambushed with each wave they send in.

And on the open fields outside Strepshire, the Saxon army takes heavy losses, and Ivar watches raptly as the armies clash. Pieces on a board, but so much more entertaining to watch.

He sees the commander call for retreat across half a battlefield.

_Alfred’s eyes lift to meet his for barely a moment, and he retreats his hand from hovering over the knight and grabs his King, moving him away and closer to the Queen. And Ivar doesn’t know much of this game the Saxons play yet, but he knows when the most important piece retreats, he has won. It is only a matter of time now._

Ivar knows it is Stithulf. He would recognize the man anywhere. Both his death and his life haunt Ivar more than he would ever admit.

It is the man that threatened his kingdom, the man that tried killing him and his brothers, the man that his wife vowed revenge against. More than almost anything, he wants him dead.

Yet he is also the man that, just by breathing, keeps you with him.

The Saxon lives in a state between dead and alive as much as you do, as much as Ivar does, it seems.

“I want that one,” He tells his men, eyes on the Christian that at the sound of his voice turns to meet his eyes. Ivar smiles, his voice a hoarse yell when he orders, “And I want him alive!”

And something familiar shines in the Saxon’s eyes. Fear.

And Ivar wonders who it is Stithulf fears, truly. If it is him, or _you_.

And it fills Ivar with a strange sort of thrill, to imagine that his wife, the woman that looks at him -and only him- with softness and warmth and what he could fool himself into believing is love, is the woman that across a sea, with nothing but the implication of her wrath, manages to make a man like Stithulf _fear_.

 _You’re smiling down at him, a smile that reminds him of that first time he saw you, of blood dripping down your lips and the war cry of a Valkyrie, “What a pair_ we _make, then. The Viking King and the Greek witch.”_

They don’t need Stithulf to retreat, and he signals his men to let them go and cower. They will strike again soon, and even if they can get far enough, they will meet again.

Now settled comfortable inside the city, Ivar walks the narrow streets, still littered with injured or dead men, towards the dilapidated building where he was told they kept Stithulf, trying to ignore the building pain in his legs at forcing himself to wear the braces for too long now.

They keep Stithulf in a darkened room, hands and legs bound with rope and arms tied to a wooden pillar at his back. Ivar takes a seat in front of him, toying with the crutch as he observes the older man.

He hadn’t noticed, though he realizes now he should have guessed, that Stithulf was not only scarred by his last encounter with you, but blinded. His eye is white and unseeing, surrounded by still-pink scar tissue.

Ivar leans closer to the Saxon, who keeps a defiant eye on his.

“That plan of yours, how is it going?”

“I’m not Bishop Heahmund, I won’t entertain your ramblings, heathen.”

That does make him smile. The fool thinks he gives nothing away by offering resistance, when he actually shows his hand more than he ever could with an open stance.

Ivar leans back with a downward curve of his mouth, “I am willing to entertain yours. So, tell me, why do all this?” He motions with his free hand all around him, “You had to know you’d lose.”

“Why did you and your brothers gather your Great Army and marched on England? Why did your wife vow to take my soul with her to her Hell?”

“Revenge? Not very Christian of you.”

“The seat of power of my home is occupied by Vikings, the last of my King’s blood was abducted by a son of Ragnar,” Stithulf’s eyes hold a certainty, a fire, that almost surprises Ivar. “Revenge is all I have left.”

“Bamburgh is not occupied, it is legally my brother’s. And your princess’ marriage to Sigurd was the work of Ecbert, no…abduction.”

The Christian laughs bitterly, mocking, “Ah, and your wife is willingly staying by your side? Tell yourself all the lies you wish, heathen, we both know the tale is other.”

“And what is this tale?”

“That none of you beasts, you… _sons of Ragnar_ , can hold on to anything. Not land, not love, not each other.”

_But you do not care to be called a beast, a monster, do you? One such as you knows better than to expect love, I suppose._

The anger starts in his chest, an old blend of too many things that it is easier to name wrath, and Ivar feels his nose furrow in a snarl, his teeth gritting together.

With the anger comes the restlessness, the need to make the pain and the anger take form, the desire to hurt back.

And he gathers, out of all the things you’ve forgiven, you could certainly forgive him for killing Stithulf instead of bringing him to you alive, couldn’t you?

For a few moments he lingers on it, he lets himself be lulled by the siren song of silencing the iron-willed Saxon once and for all. To silence his voice and all the others that agree with him.

But your voice is clear in his head as if it were being spoken by you again, as if you were sitting across from him and looking into his eyes and whispering, _while he still lives, I have reasons to stay here._

And he stays frozen, lingering on the realization that bound and helpless lies the man that he promised you as a gift, that the one thing keeping you in Kattegat could be dead soon, that the promise could be fulfilled and you could be gone before winter is over. And so Ivar stays there, frozen for too long trying to think of all the possible outcomes, as if this were but yet another battle, but finding himself unable to think of anything other than a life without you in it.

_Gone is the woman that had an axe to her neck and still asked if she should be impressed, and pleading eyes search his, “You cannot do this, you cannot expect me to-…don’t put chains on me.”_

The answer was always there, wasn’t it? Even if you say you can’t choose, the choice has already been made.

 _You turn to face him, steeled resolve shining in your gaze, arrogance in your posture, “You won’t be the first man to try to chain me. My very blood makes me belong to them. Athens, and Sparta,_ Greece _; it’ll summon me to return sooner or later.”_

It was never even a choice, was it? You were always going to belong to them, you were always going to love and need and _choose_ them.

_A deep breath, and you meet your gaze, a resigned sort of strength making you give him your answer, that is as unwavering as your voice, “I would leave.”_

He stays frozen, for so long it seems, that even Stithulf grows bored of the silence.

“I assume you’ll be taking me with you to your home?”

“It won’t do you any good to assume anything.” Ivar tells him, curving his mouth downwards in a nonchalant grimace, trying to dispel the thoughts from his head, trying to focus on the present.

The older man only keeps his eyes on the nothingness ahead, as if he can see a ghost in his mind’s eye.

A ghost that with a knife in her hand and his neck within reach chose to scar him, a ghost that with a smile talked in a foreign tongue and promised him suffering and death.

“She made you promise her my head, didn’t she? And you agreed,” Stithulf chuckles, and he almost sounds proud, “Too smart for her own good, that witch. And too beautiful for ours.”

Ivar doesn’t bother hiding his disgust, toys with the idea of blinding Stithulf’s remaining eye. What was that story you told him? _Walk the Underworld blind, deaf, and dumb, so that all the dead know…_

Instead, he mocks, “Are you going to sit there and talk about my wife?”

“Well, I am sitting here with nowhere to go, and you aren’t talking about anything.”

“I thought you weren’t to entertain my ramblings.”

Stithulf only shrugs as well as he can with bound arms, keeping his one good eye on Ivar.

“Plans change.”

“Ah, like your plans involving your Bishop. You sent him to die to Kattegat’s border.” Ivar tells him, eyeing him from the corner of his eye as he pours himself a drink.

“Leofric? It was his choice, a choice he made once he was no longer needed. He is-…” Stithulf stops himself, considering his choice of words, and looks at Ivar inquisitively. All he offers in response is a small smile and the lift of his eyebrows over the rim of his cup. The Saxon amends, “… _was_ a man of God, he lived by Christian teachings, he died for the Lord and so he shall be-…”

Ivar decides to ignore the rest of his words, rolling his eyes and letting his head follow the movement. For a man that claims to not be anything like Heahmund, Stithulf seems to love the sound of his own voice as much as the other man did.

But there were things Leofric said before dying that Ivar still needs answers to.

“Your Bishop, he said something about dead men breathing.” Ivar interrupts, eyeing Stithulf carefully, looking for any give in his expression.

The Saxon only stares at him, impassively, “Are you one to fear ghosts, heathen?”

He looks into his eyes, both blinded and piercing, and he doesn’t see a man. But he doesn’t see a piece on a board.

He sees a dying fire, he sees a choked flame, he sees an ending. He sees the last flickering light that’s keeping Ivar from the darkness.

And he cannot let it go out, not yet.

Even though Ivar will deny it until Valhalla calls to him, it is infuriatingly easy for you to get him to grant you whatever you wish.

You need only look at him and offer a soft and secret smile, or a touch of your hand on his arm, or a whisper of his name, and he is pathetically gone, ready to grant you whatever it will be that could keep you happy, safe.

You asked him without words to know where the place you were in was located on a map, long before he knew your name, in some old hut in Aneridge. And as if the Gods themselves moved his hand, he pointed to the location of the small town, growing a little warm at the sight of the softness in grateful eyes that looked up at him.

You ask silently for his attention with your chin resting on his shoulder, with your fingers skimming over his arm, with your hand on his. And, lovesick fool he is, he answers each of those summonses without thinking twice about it; turning to you and meeting your gaze.

And he likes to think -no, no, he knows, because he knows you, because…he knows- that in the last kiss you shared while it was still just the two of you, before the people set watchful eyes on you and the titles laid heavy on your heads; you asked him for the same thing he asks the Gods: for more time.

And so he leans forward, holding onto a knife, one of a set of five of which one still is kept safe by you.

Ivar’s eyes look into Stithulf’s grey one, and he watches the Christian squirm and groan as he retraces with the knife the scar you gave him, drawing blood and pain.

As he restarts the count, he breathes life to the dying embers.

“Run,” He tells him, the next movement of the bloodied knife cutting the rope that binds Stithulf’s legs, but not the one on his wrists. “We will meet again.”

And when the sun rises and the men wake up, they will hear him demand to know where the Christian has gone to, maybe they will even see him punish some undeserving fool.

And he will ignore Ubbe’s knowing stare, and he will set sail home and lie through his teeth, and live in this borrowed time a while longer.

Just this winter. Just one winter with you, and he’ll readily face spring and whatever it brings then.

____

Ivar never really saw love. Or experienced it. He doesn’t really know what it is like to love, or be loved, other than his mother, and Floki, maybe.

But he never witnessed it either, and that’s what he dwells on as the ships approach the docks. For a lifetime of watching, of being witness to how other men achieved the things he once believed he never could achieve himself; Ivar never really saw love.

His father was never there, and even when he was, it wasn’t love what kept him and Aslaug married. It was a quiet respect, a strange rivalry kept at bay by something other than themselves.

He hasn’t seen Sigurd in years, but even before it all fell apart, Ivar knew it wasn’t love what he and Blaeja had. It was companionship, a blend of resignation and relief at how out of all the possible outcomes, they happened to be bound to one another.

Floki did love Helga, he knows that, and he knows Helga loved him. But it was so drowned by the quiet sorrow, the way Helga would look at Floki, and it was so jarringly painful, the way Floki would look at his wife.

And Ivar still remembers the edge in that Greek’s voice as he called your name, he still remembers the look in your face as he died in your arms. But in quiet nights you’ve told him that was never love, that was illusion and guilt.

So, he doesn’t really know what love looks like, or what it is.

He doesn’t really know if the way your eyes have a strange shine to them and you smile despite yourself as you meet his gaze from the docks is love.

But he wants it to be.

And he understands the poor fool that believed every lie you told him, including that you loved him. Because you do not need speak a word other than his name, and Ivar is willing to close his eyes and pretend what you said were words of love.

He doesn’t have time to dwell on it, and grow angry at himself for still craving useless things, like softness, like love.

You are standing in front of him, wide smile and the faint shine of tears in your eyes, and he realizes in the quiet that you bring that he has had this small voice whispering that it would all turn out to be a mirage all this time.

Because this is real, because this is _his_ ; Ivar’s hand is certain on the back of your head, and he brings you to him and claims your mouth.

There’s a soft sound against his lips that sends a thrill of warmth down his spine, and your hands are warm against him as your mouth moves against his own, as you surrender to his kiss.

In the warmth you bring he realizes there truly was a part of him that believed that when he returned everything that had changed before he left would turn out to be nothing but a dream.

Your hands are on his chest, and your eyes focus on them for a few moments before you lift your gaze up to him.

“I missed you, Ivar.” You tell him, quietly, easily. You say it in a breath, as if it is simple. And it is simple, he gathers, though it doesn’t feel like _simple_ in the way his chest pulls tight at the words.

He leans down and kisses you again, seals those words against his own lips, finds a way to make the promise they whisper more than words. And he kisses you -or you kiss him, he doesn’t think he minds the difference- until your lips are bearing the mark of him, and your breaths are labored.

You blink, dazedly, as if awakening from a dream, and it feels Ivar with pride to be able to disarm you, at least partly.

“How many…how many injured?” You ask, for the first time looking around you, “Your brother, is he…?”

“He’s well,” He tells you, and searches your eyes before adding, “Stithulf still lives.”

And Ivar may not know what love looks like, but he does know what relief looks like. And that surely shines in your eyes at his words.


	7. Vár

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vár: spring (Old Norse)
> 
> Parallell to Chapter 37 (Chapter 38 on Ao3)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen, lemme share a secret with ya: I tried my hardest not making Ivar a bottom/sub in this, I truly did, but…I failed. So, if sub!Ivar ain’t your thing (it’s not explicit exactly, but it’s there, and I am sometimes bothered by descriptions of him in a very dominant position so I’d understand if the opposite happens to you, which is why I’m warning you), feel free to skip past the first ____ and you’re good. Thank you!

To say that in the last few days Ivar has grown fascinated -addicted, you’d argue- to exploring your body and every sound you make would be an understatement.

There’s a surge of pride inside his chest that hasn’t left him since that night, a satisfaction at knowing he can satisfy a woman, at knowing the most beautiful woman he knows, the woman they all want, wants _him.  
_

Ivar cannot get enough of the sight of you lost in the throes of the pleasure _he_ gives you, and he loses his breath alongside with his mind each time your voice turns rougher and your hand -delicate, soft hand that somehow has the strength of Fenrir’s bindings when you touch him- grips onto his own as his fingers curl deep inside of you, your free hand pushing him down against the bed, sometimes close enough to his throat that Ivar has to grit his teeth to keep a plea of your name from leaving his lips; when you, in all the arrogance and the might that he hates and loves in equal measure, still his movements with a wrap of your fingers around his wrist and instead of having him give you pleasure you _take it,_ you demand from him whatever you want and…Gods, that’s a sight he doesn’t think he will never get enough of.

And he’s addicted to the taste of you; to the sounds you make when he works his mouth and his tongue against you, chants of his name that reverberate through his chest and make him almost tremble with the realization that he is the reason behind them, that leave him warm and proud because he made you feel this way, and your moans and sighs and whimpers are gentle praise washing over him; to the way you grip and tug at his hair, bordering on pain and making shivers and something else run down his spine, and your thighs shake, and your back arches off the bed, and you _come apart_ , and it is because of him, only he can do this to you, only him is who you want to do this to you, and he knows he is addicted, he knows there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for this, for _you_.

There’s still a part of him -and there will always be, a part of him that grows louder some days- that resents that this also has to be different, that not even in sex he can be _normal._

And that part of him, a part of him made of snarls that demanded answers from the Gods and of wrath and promises of death whispered in the ear of a slave; that part was quietened, pliant, satisfied, in your arms that night when you kissed him, stealing his breath and his mind and his heart, and reached down to touch him.

He once wished he had the words to tell you to do with him -with his body, defective and lacking as he sees it- what you wished, to tell you to claim the rest of him as ruthlessly as you claimed his heart; and it is that need, and that awe at the unwavering woman that kissed him until he ached and unwaveringly whispered _more than any other man in my life, I want_ you; that made him take so long to stop you, that night.

He still remembers what it felt like, surrendering to you in that brief moment. He still remembers how it felt like his head was filled with noise and his heart and breath was out of his control.

He remembers how he could feel everywhere you were touching him, your lips on his neck pressing soft kisses in the places you had bitten and licked, your chest to his side almost holding him up when he leaned into you, your hand squeezing softly and moving over him with increasing pressure, making electricity run down his spine and heat coil low in his stomach.

And he remembers allowing himself to give in, and how _good_ it felt. How he surrendered to falling and yet he didn’t, because you were there, soft breaths and gentle touches; how your delicate hand was so different from…that woman’s cold and distant touch, or from his own rough and desperate grip as he tried uselessly to prove to himself that night had been a mistake, a nightmare.

Ivar remembers how good it felt, and how overwhelming, and how easy it would have been to surrender then. For once, it could have been _easy_ , because he trusts you and you love him and you want him and…

But no, no, it couldn’t be. Because he would fail, and he’d see the disgust in your eyes, and he’d feel the shame and the pain again, and couldn’t. So he stopped you. He had to.

He had to. Right?

Yes, of course he did. He needs to remember what his reality is, he needs to remember what failure feels like, and he needs to remember it would burn all the more if it were you he failed.

 _You could never fail me, Ivar, no matter what_ , you told him, and he knows you meant it, he trusts you, but saying something is not the same as knowing it.

And it is easy, it always is, to remember what that night felt like. The dawning horror, the pain, the humiliation, the _anger_. It is easy to remember, it is easy to still feel the burning shame, the anguish, the desperate need to curse and plea with the Gods for a reason why.

And because it is so easy to remember, and because his mind sometimes torments him with dreams of being in that situation again only it is your eyes looking back, and it isn’t false comfort from a slave, but your voice unfaltering and biting as you snarl at him the words he thinks of himself sometimes; that he stops you that night, and he doesn’t regret it. You don’t push since, and he’s almost thankful for that.

____

This isn’t the first night you take Valdís’ son in your arms and spend most of the feast talking with the boy and making him laugh. But it is the first time the sight leaves Ivar unable to look away.

The blonde boy looks up at you with big eyes, and your smile is unlike anything Ivar has ever seen when you look down at him.

“I haven’t told you of Achilles yet, have I?” You ask, chuckling at the eager shake of the boy’s head. “Well, he was the strongest of all men,” You tell him, exaggerating your features and the gestures of your free hand, “No sword could pierce his skin, no army was a match for him, and all of Greece knew of his fame.

Ivar knows this story, you told him many times before of the wars of your homeland and the legends the Greeks once were, when their Gods were with them. Still, he ignores everything else and focuses on the way you gesture and talk as you tell the young boy the story, while Valdís’ son looks at you with wide eyes as you recall some of the Demigod’s victories in the Trojan War and those that came before.

You lean closer to the boy, whispering your next words as if sharing a secret.

“But he had a secret weakness, something that could end him.”

“No!” He cries, surprise and innocent interest in his expression. You chuckle, but continue the tale.

“You see, he was invincible, _except_ his heel.”

“His heel?” The boy repeats, and you nod severely. You press cold fingers against the boy’s heel, and smile when he releases a laugh.

“If he was struck there, he was just a man, no longer a fearsome warrior, no longer invincible,” You confess and finish with a sad smile, “An arrow went through his heel while he was fighting, and Achilles died.”

“But he died fighting!” The boy insists. Ivar notices your confusion at the turn of the conversation, but you still nod, murmuring your assent. The child’s expression switches from mildly anguished to determined and somewhat serene, “Then he’s in Valhalla, with all the others. I will meet him when I’m old like you and ask him to tell me more stories.”

There’s a strange glint in your eye when he says that, the same one you had when Ivar told you Keres and Valkyries sound like one and the same, the same one you have when you speak of the life beyond this one.

You shake it off soon enough, and your expression is fierce when you stare down at the shieldmaiden’s son.

“But first you ought to grow strong, and once you’ve grown you ought to fight and persevere, Aghi, so that you have stories to tell him when you meet him in Valhalla.”

“You sound like mama.”

“Because I am always right!” Valdís yells from her side of the table, and Ivar watches as you laugh at the shieldmaiden’s words, before leaning close to press a kiss to the boy’s blonde hair.

“Puts ideas in your head, doesn’t it?” Ubbe’s voice startles Ivar, and he turns to his brother with a scowl that the other man ignores, keeping his focus ahead, “She’d be a good mother.”

There’s a part of him that Ivar was never quite capable of extinguishing that wants to rely on Ubbe, wants to tell him how impossible it is for him to make you a mother, wants to trust his big brother in all the annoying and pitiful patience he still holds towards Ivar.

But he doesn’t, he would never speak of such things, not even with Ubbe. He still hears a voice tell him how pathetic and weak he was for needing your comfort when he spoke out loud about his inability to be a father.

Instead of sharing that, Ivar leans back on his chair and turns to Ubbe with raise brows.

“How come you don’t have children yet?” He asks, but there’s no malice behind his tone. Or, he doesn’t intend for it to be. With a tilt of his head, he adds, “Have you forgotten your duty to marry and breed, brother?”

Ubbe chuckles, remembering as much as Ivar -perhaps even more than he does, since he is the eldest- their mother’s words.

“Very irresponsible of me, I know.” His older brother comments, the smile turning a little bittersweet before Ubbe takes a gulp from his drink.

He won’t lie to himself and say it is his short conversation with Ubbe what makes him linger on the stupid thoughts of a family. Those thoughts, those images of a life for a very long time he hasn’t dared even think about, have been with him since you told him _we can have children._

Ivar knows it should unsettle him, at least more than it already does, how easily you have made him completely trust in you. Enough to speak of the shame he has carried with him since that damn night with Margrethe, enough to believe you when you told him that there was a way to have what he wanted even if not through normal means. He’s never done things the normal way, though, has he?

He watches you put your hands up as claws in front of you, and fake a growl as you pretend to threaten Valdís’ son, and finds his lips pulling into a smile.

He wonders what stories you’d tell your children, he wonders what your sons would say of their mother, he wonders what your daughters would inherit from you.

And Ivar lets himself imagine it. He mead softens the edges of his thoughts; and your smile warms him more than the alcohol ever could; and you love him, you told him you do, and you told him one day the two of you could have a family; and he doesn’t stop himself from imagining what it would be like.

He imagines what it would be like to return home to find not only you waiting for him at the docks, but a few sons and daughters eager to hear of their father’s triumphs. You told him that his children would have his strength and his intelligence, but he wants them to have your resolve and maybe even your arrogance.

He imagines what it would be like to hear you late at night telling your children of the beasts and heroes of your homeland, only for Ivar to interrupt just as he does now, with arguments about how the world is according to _his_ Gods and his ways. Even if not of your blood or his, your children would inherit the world if Ivar -and you, most likely- had any say in it, he knows this.

And later that night the shieldmaiden takes the boy from your arms and gives you a one-armed hug goodbye, and you make your way back to Ivar, and sit on the armrest of his chair and lean against him when his arm wraps around your waist, and he doesn’t let go of it, of that fantasy, of those images.

You are here with him, and he can pretend winter can last for as long as wishes it to.

____

The night was supposed to be as any other. The night was supposed to be one of the comfortable intimacy he’s grown to revel in and your soft touches and your words of love. He was supposed to be able to hold on to this, to you, for as long as winter lasted.

Winter was supposed to _last_.

But, he thinks bitterly as he undoes the last clasp on the brace of his leg, why did eh think something was going to be normal for him? Even the seasons may be different for _Ivar the Boneless._

And he starts asking questions, partly because he hates it when you’re quiet, partly because he wants your voice to overpower the one that tells him _she’s leaving she’s leaving she’s leaving._

Ivar knows what will win at the end. He isn’t an idiot, he knows nostalgia will win every time. He knows no matter how many times he beckons you to him you will always answer the call of your homeland, he knows a piece of land was enough of a reward to make you survive endless things and he knows that piece of land is nothing compared to having your people back with you.

He should have spared some men to find the bodies of the Greeks, to confirm to himself they were all truly dead like Stithulf said they were. Too worried with the foreign witch he wanted to bring to Kattegat, he overlooked it, and now he pays for it.

Because then, then he could have killed them all and left them in some field you’d never find out about, he could have done what Stithulf couldn’t. Then, he could have killed them all without an ounce of guilt or a moment of hesitation. Then, he wouldn’t have anything to lose by doing something unforgivable.

And so now all he can think about is how stupid he was, how foolishly blinded he let himself become; not only then, but now. Now, imagining a future with you, a family with you; imagining what stories you’d tell your sons and daughters, dreaming of an eternity with you at his side and children to tell your stories, his story.

You hesitate only for a breath when he asks you where they are now, and it is enough to make the dread and the wrath grow inside him. And for all they whisper and fear Ivar the Boneless’ rage, they don’t speak of how needed it is, of how much he depends on it.

It is the one thing holding him together, more often than not.

And he holds on to that anger when he accuses, “Are you trying to hide where they went, hm? Shield them from me?”

He doesn’t hear your answer, but he knows he interrupts you when you’re talking, and he knows that you hate it when he does that. Good. He wants you to be angry.

“I don’t need your permission or your help to find them,” He tells you, and you both know it is true. And he wants to, he wants to find them and see for himself what it is of these people and their home that is enough to take you away from him. Ivar can’t help but imagine you surrounded by your people, smile wide and warm and happy, and _without him_. He knows you’ve dreamt of it, that since learning they are alive you’ve probably spent so much time thinking what your reunion with the people that call you Anassa will be like. And he wants to take that from you, he wants to make the fantasy shatter before your eyes, he wants to make you see how easily stupid and pathetic fantasies of love and a future and _happiness_ are lost. He wants you to feel like he does. And so he pushes where he knows it will hurt, he threatens your fantasy of nostalgia and reunion with what he knows can make it shatter, “I could have them all killed. Tie each of them to a pyre and burn them alive.”

There it is, the hardening of your stance, the coldness in your eyes, and though a part of him hates it, and something churns at his stomach when your voice lowers and your expression betrays nothing, this is exactly what he wanted.

He wants you to let go of foolish dreams of fields of flowers and the warmth of the sun, he wants you to let die the part of you that insists you are a daughter of Greece, he wants you to end the fantasy he knows you have to have been holding onto about returning to your Eleusis and your sunny places.

And, of course, you fight back, and your voice rises alongside your temper. Stubborn, maddening woman that you are, you refuse to back down.

He gestures with his arm and knocks over the small vase of some almost-lifeless plant you kept there, and his eyes watch it fall to the ground.

At the tip of his tongue there’s a curse about how many fucking plants you keep in this room and every other room you get your hands on, but he bites the words back -or chokes on them- because it is with horrifying certainty that he realizes the plants would die without you, and they would disappear, and the mark of you in his world would easily disappear, once you leave.

Ivar’s eyes linger on the pitiful green leaves that lay there on the floor, and he remembers you telling him about this one, he remembers seeing this one near Kattegat.

And he realizes, to his doom or his salvation, if there are such things, that this is a new plant, that you brought it here in the time he was gone, most likely after you knew about your people.

And this one and countless other little planters and vases litter the room, put there for you to look after them, promises of permanence scattered through the room you and Ivar share.

He wants to believe that is what they are. That they are proof you can find a way to keep your fields of flowers and your sunny home with you even if the place he brought you to is cold and harsh; and not desperate attempts to keep the home he took you from with you in any way possible.

He wishes he could ask, just as he wishes he could ask you why you aren’t with them, why, when you have had so many opportunities to do so, you choose to stay.

But he doesn’t, because he doesn’t want to hear the answer he already knows. That Stithulf is the one thing keeping you with him.

Later you settle against him on the bed, as warm and as soft as you always are -he doesn’t understand why he expected different-, and Ivar doesn’t resist the urge to pull you closer.

He presses his lips against you with as much softness as he can muster, with as much of the gentleness you deserve but he doesn’t have in him he can give you, and tells you that he loves you. He has loved you for a long time, longer than he cares to admit, though he doesn’t know why it is now the moment he chooses to tell you.

It is foolish, he knows it is, but the admission hurts, the admission is jagged edges and raw nerves and it speaks of the possibility of losing you. Then again, to Ivar that is what love is: jagged edges and raw nerves and the always present fear of _losing._

Because his head reminds him, with his fumbled thoughts chasing one another in circles, that admitting to loving you now of all times, now that you have them waiting for you, now that you have proven to yourself and to him that you could leave Kattegat and he’d be none the wiser, now that he is unmoored and unsteady and pitifully afraid; isn’t a smart thing to do, that it is a pathetic attempt to pretend he and whatever he can offer you are enough to get you to choose to stay, and that you _know it_.

Though the kiss you press against his chest gives him a brisk moment of warmth, it leaves as quickly as it washes over him, and Ivar looks up at the nothingness above him as you relax into sleep.

Because he knows it isn’t enough. Love isn’t enough to keep you from your duty, from your legacy; he isn’t enough to keep you from your homeland, this realm isn’t enough to keep you from your fields of flowers.

There’s nothing he can do, even if he wants to. Even if he imagines and plans a way to find the Greeks and kill them all before they get a chance at stealing you from him, he knows that if you choose them -of you choose to leave him- there’s no binds that can keep you with him.

If you choose to leave not even iron shackles can keep you with him, because Ivar knows all he will have of you is the snarling curses and the cold and cruel glances.

And so the night goes on and he keeps unseeing eyes on the ceiling above him, holding you close and finding himself as shackled, as powerless, as he once made you. Ivar wonders briefly if your Gods have found a way to punish him for what he did, he remembers you once told him they would scorn him for taking a Hiereia and making her a slave, for taking your choice from you.

And now he is the one without a choice. If he does something to keep you, or if he doesn’t, it doesn’t matter, because one way or another, when the day comes and you choose to leave him, you will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading, I hope this was okay, and I hope it could clarify a bit more of Ivar’s actions/reactions in Chapter 38. As for the title choice, it is mainly due ot how I like playing with the ideas of what spring and winter can mean, same as with Persephone and Hades’ roles. While Ivar of course represents Hades, it is Ivar who returns to Kattegat to kickstart the winter in Chapter 36, for example. In the case of this chapter, and Chapter 38, the winter is settling as a season, but the element of change that spring is characterized with becomes apparent in this chapter, moreso for Ivar than for the Reader; hence the title.
> 
> Sorry for the ramble, I’m a mess lol. Thank you for reading, I hope you’re doing good!


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